London-Based AI Startup, Research Grid Raises $6.48M in Funding

Research Grid, the AI startup that automates back-office admin for clinical trials, has raised $6.48 million in seed funding.

Fuel Ventures led the funding,  supported by Arve Capital, Ada Ventures, Morgan Stanley Inclusive Ventures Lab, Arāya Ventures, Ascension Ventures, Plug and Play Ventures, and Atomico Angels, among others. 

Research Grid will use the funding to invest in R&D, develop more AI automation, and build out its engineering teams. It also plans to grow its marketing and sales functions as it expands its presence in the U.S. and Asian markets.

Research Grid is Streamlining the Clinical Trial Lifecycle

Amber Hill founded the London-based startup in 2020. After a solid 14-year career as a Medical Researcher, she became frustrated with repetitive administrative tasks and started the company.

The clinical trials market has long been a major bottleneck in the drug development process. This issue is often caused by using legacy software systems and manual processes to manage trials, which results in inefficiency, errors, and weak patient engagement. 

“I spent 14 years as a medical researcher and would spend hundreds of hours copying data from one system to another,” HiIl, the founder and CEO of Research Grid. “The back-office process is completely broken. When you multiply this across the industry, the costs for patients and research institutions are astronomical.”  

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Delays to clinical trials are also expensive, costing up to $400 million per year per trial running to Phase 3, just on back-office admin.

To solve this problem, Research Grid developed two products, Inclusive and TrialEngine, which allow its customers to seamlessly manage the entire life cycle of clinical trials in one place.

Both products are powered by Research Grid’s patented-pending AI algorithms, which automate many administrative and data management workflows. This eliminates the monotonous work, freeing highly qualified medical researchers to focus on more meaningful work.

Research Grid’s new funding is critical for the clinical trials market, as artificial intelligence is poised to accelerate drug discovery rapidly.

The AI startup helps its customers cut months off trial timelines while dramatically reducing their costs and driving up success rates. On average, Research Grid customers see 98% efficiency gains, 45% cost savings, and 145% increase in patient engagement.

Staking on The Next Unicorn 

With this funding, Research Grid plans to scale its engineering and sales teams while investing in R&D for advanced AI solutions. 

Speaking about the latest funding, Hill said, “We’re delighted to have the support of our investors. Now, we’re focusing on expanding our engineering teams and scaling up our R&D efforts, allowing us to deliver more of the features our customers ask for. We’ll also be growing our sales and marketing team to take advantage of opportunities in the U.S. and Asia.”

Shiv Patel, Partner at Fuel Ventures, said: “We are committed to backing the country’s most innovative and disruptive businesses, and our investment into Research Grid reinforces this. While AI is making significant waves in drug discovery, clinical trials are still the main barrier to medicine reaching the people who need it.” 

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“Research Grid is strategically placed to exploit the urgent demand for automating clinical trials at scale. Its rapid growth has shown that the market is mainly green-field, with validation from across the industry in the U.S. and Europe, including big pharma and contract research organizations and sites. Every investor wants to find unicorns, and with the clinical trial market expected to reach over $95 billion in the next five years, we believe in the mission, proposition, and trajectory of Research Grid,” she continued.